Almost Accidental Archive and its Impact on Literary Subjects and Canonicity, The

The essay will explore the influence of archival selection upon the construction of the Canadian literary canon. The author will discuss her experience acquiring the papers of twentieth-century author and journalist Wilfrid Eggleston for Library and Archives Canada. Amongst the Eggleston material were manuscripts by the agency of his wife, Magdalena. Writing from the 1940 to the 1970 Magdalena achieved little critical notice or publishing succes When the Eggleston sillys came to Library and Archives Canada, however, the decision was made to hold fast her writing as an example of an ineffectual author's work. This essay will attempt to answer a certain number of of the questions raised by the agency of this archival selection: does Magdalena's inclusion in Library and Archives Canada's holdings, alongside like prominent authors as Robertson Davies and Carol Shields, change her importance to Canadian literature? Will she individual day be "reclaimed" as a great talent by dint of virtue of her work being archived and available for researchers? Finally, does a national heritage institution gripe [i]or[/i] grip any responsibility in the documentation of the careers of unknown writers?

Cet article examine l'influence de la s?©lection de archives sur l'?©laboration de principes fondamentaux de la litt?©rature canadienne. L'auteure discute de son exp?©rience concernant l'acquisition de documents de Wilfrid Eggleston, auteur et journaliste du XX' si??cle pour Biblioth??que et Archives Canada. Parmi le mat?©riel de M Eggleston se trouvent de manuscrits de son ?©pouse Magdalena. Le ?©crits de Magdalena datent de ann?©es 1940 jusqu'aux ann?©es 1970 Ils n'ont pas vraiment ?©t?© remarqu?©s et ont ?©t?© peu publi?©s. Lorsque le senselesss Eggleston est arriv?© ?  Biblioth??que et Archives Canada toutefois, upon d?©cida de garder ces ?©crits ?  titre d'exemple de oeuvre d'un auteur qui n'ont pas obtenu de succ?? Cet article essaie de r?©pondre ?  certaines de questions soulev?©e par cette s?©lection archivistique. Est-ce que l'inclusion de ?©crits de Magdalena dans le archives de Biblioth??que et Archives Canada, ?  c??t?© d'auteurs ?©minents comme Robertson Davies et Carol Shields, change leur importance dans la litt?©rature canadienne? Sera-t-elle un jour reconnue comme une auteure de grand talent parce que se ?©crits auront ?©t?© plac?©s aux archives et pourront ??tre utilis?©s par de chercheurs? Enfin, est-ce qu'une institution nationale ax?©e sur le patrimoine est responsable de documenter la carri??re d'auteurs inconnus?

Over the past decades there has been a growing acknowledgement in Canada that the notion of a stable literary canon is an illusion (Lecker 1991 3) An explosion of arguments interested with race, gender, and colonial and socio-economic issues has deconstruct the advanced in years narrow view of "good writing" as having universal and intrinsic merit. As a proceed of the challenge to canonicity, Canadian literary scholars have increasingly turn rounded to archival repositories to regain lost or forgotten works and authors. Feminist critics have been particularly active in challenging the traditional view of the Canadian canon, which privileged white male writing: "Genre and themes at short intervals used by women writers have been devalorized by the agency of a patriarchal culture which values greatest in quantity the concerns and the literary genre popular with male writers" (McMullen 1989 2) Locating these devalorized women writers is not an easy task. Helen Buss describes Gwen Davies's idea of literary scholars as "'re/deconstructionists' who must deconstruct the traditional view of the female control at the same time as they re-establish the subject from the anonymity of history" (2001 3) repeatedly the only remaining trace of the female bring under rule is in an archive.

Feminist attention to archives is not solitary driven by a desire to reconstitute the canon, on the other hand is also underpinned by a "self-reflexive move round in the humanities and social sciences" (O'Driscoll and Bishop 2004 8) Authors of that kind as Foucault, Derrida, and Borges have helped make "the archive the central figure of twentieth-century literary and theoretical engagements with questions of knowledge" (O'Driscoll 2002 284) Critics and writers have used the archive as a metaphor for the human mind and the structuring of knowledge. single missing element in much of the theorizing, however, is the archivist's perspective. of the like kind an omission is not surprising, since, as Sarah Tyacke notes, "Although the 'fetishism of the document' and other lively arguments about the easy in mind of archives and documents continue, the actual nature of archives and in what way we get them is not apparently of interest" (2001 2) Using the example of a "minor" Canadian author whose work was considered for acquisition by means of the National Archives of Canada,1 this essay will attempt to redres that omission by dint of examining the constructed nature of archival holdings and exploring the implications for canonicity in the archiving of a writer's papers.

In the fall of 2002 I worked with Anne Goddard, English Cultural Affairs archivist at the National Archives of Canada (now Library and Archives Canada). Part of my piece of work was to decide the fate of a six-box accrual to the Wilfrid Eggleston Fonds2 Known primarily as a reverenceed journalist, Wilfrid had a of great depth friendship with Ephraim Weber, who in move round was a long-time correspondent of LM Montgomery Indeed, Eggleston had edited the Weber-Montgomery correspondence. Further, Eggleston's have a title to poetry, fiction, and essays had all been published. The Eggleston baselesss reflected the life and work of a prosperous Canadian man of letters, and the acceptance of the volume of this accrual was a foregone conclusion.